Twenty-five infographics lessons from Malofiej 20

No. 1: Beauty leads to understanding

Beauty draws you in, and a story gets told, says Bryan Christie, illustrator and artist who specializes in medical and scientific illustrations. Christie showed an early graphic depicting the affects of Anthrax poisoning. The figure was stiff, inhuman and, well, purple. On a vacation to Rome, and the Vatican, he saw Michaelangelo’s “Pieta.” It floored him, he said, bringing him literally to tears. His figures now capture the expressiveness of the human form. The beauty of the human form. Christie, who uses 3-D modeling programs emphasized that we must use the tools of drawing and photography to get the most out for our work. “These are photographic tools,” he said, “but in the end, it’s a drawing. And we’ve turned out back on drawing.”

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Bryan Christie on 3D graphics: use the tools of photography, but endpoint is a drawing. Don’t lose sight of history of drawing #malofiej

No. 2: A system for thinking about dataviz

A good data visualization must start with a clear purpose and that purpose has to be followed through the steps of developing the idea, scrubbing the data and executing the visualization, according to Andy Kirk, a freelance data visualization design consultant and trainer based in the UK. Kirk is also the founder and editor of the website VisualisingData.com.

No. 3: The 6-month rule

Bryan Christie is so critical of his work, he has the 6-month rule. He waits 6 months before looking at it. If that’s not a lesson to take your work seriously, to push for perfection, what could that kind of lesson be?

No. 4: The best graphics take the best reporting

The foreign graphics editor for the New York Times, Sergio Peçanha, gave an inside view to a few of his projects. Each one represented a simple journalistic lesson: Good old-fashioned reporting on a strong story trumps all. And great stories put large trends in the perspective of people, people who live in war zones and have their lives torn apart by large world events. For a photo-montage of a street in Misrata, Libya, which had been devastated by bombing, Sergio, tracked down sources to shoot photos of a stretch of the street and annotate the “normal” things that used to be there, from homes to cell phone stores. He found sources that could cross-check until the story was nailed. He did the same old shoe-leather work diagramming the progress of protests in Egypt, scanning thousands of images, tracking down sources and cross-confirming all the facts. It’s easy to forget, when sitting behind the computer that we have find a story and aggressively report it.

No. 5: Speaking of which, dataviz works better with some shoe-leather

Simon Rogers, editor of the guardian.co.uk/data, a resource of raw datasets, and news editor on the Guardian emphasized a fast, journalistic take on using data for news. The Guardian’s work on the UK riots demonstrated a number of quick techniques to get data, crunch it and present it in a way that is useful for users. They used twitter feeds to show how people were communicating about the riots. They used court records, some they had to scan and collate to get a solid data set to show where arrests occurred and how that corresponded with poverty. They sued and got access for court records to show how those arrested in the riots were being treated as compared to average. Whatever the subject, the Guardian crew looked as data as a live story and took aggressive steps to get that story infront of users.

No. 6: And context helps, too

Data and visualization can change the way people live their lives, especially when data is presented in an understandable way at a moment and point when people are making key decisions. Andrew Vande Moere, an associate professor at the Department of Architecture, Urbanism and Planning of the University of Leuven in Belgium, presented simple charting at someone’s house showing energy use as compared to a past benchmark. One key aspect was to have information presented to users in a natural and calm manner.

No. 7: The hammer and the onion

The hammer:Albert Cairo, lecturer at the University of Miami presents a blunt metaphor for infographics. “Infographics are a tool for understanding,” he says, brandishing a picture of a hammer. They should explain a lot with as little as possible.

The onion: But in delivering blunt-force of information, we should not shy away from embracing complexity. Like an onion, an infographic needs to have many layers, each one aiding clarity to a story it is telling.

New York Times cartographer and developer Matthew Bloch readers of the Times have been known to spend an average of around 5 minutes viewing interactive maps. That indicates that many readers are spending a lot more than 5 minutes.

No. 9: For the love of code

Some programmers, according to Bloch are naturally born and find making code exciting. For others it’s soul-destroying. “Sometimes I’m not sure which I belong to,” he said. For the Times’ html5 election map, there were 13,000 lines of code that included a Flash fallback for users with browsers that wouldn’t support html5.

No. 10: Curate your own style

Former Wired art director Carl de Torres, now with his own studio in Oakland, Calif., uses simple shapes and colors to explain complex ideas. The approach had its roots at Wired where there was a constant need to explain complex stories about digital themes, in new ways. He has carried his bold, iconic style, inspired in part by early work by Anton Stanikowski, in editorial and advertising work. Torres’ approach adds punch and excitement to stories

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De Torres: his work process @wired: sketching, jazz, coffee and let it flow, day and nite #malofiej20

No. 11: And do it with some corazón

Jaime Serra, columnist and director of infographics and Illustration at La Vanguardia demonstrated something very simple and beautiful as he read and showed some of his visual columns. A great story has heart. When the format comes together with text and images and sound, people are attracted to heart, to good stories that help explain the mysteries of the world.

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Jaime @ja_serra at @malofiej: this presentation si simply mind-blowing. What a character!

No. 12: Keys to building a network diagram

The keys to making an clear, beautiful data visualization network, according to Moritz Stefaner, a freelance “truth and beauty operator” in data visualization, with a background in Cognitive Science, is a mission that aims for a certain truth and execution that beautifully clear. This has to apply to how the links of the network are designed, as to the nodes, the overarching hierarchy and interface or interactivity.

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#malofiej20 @moritz_stefaner present a coherent whole and let the user pick the focus

No. 14: Art and science of maps

Senior Graphics Editor for National Geographic Magazine, Virginia Mason, showed a selection of the magazine’s incredible maps. All of the maps are based on the science of cartography, through conceptualization, research and iteration. They are scientific expressions of the amazing stories being told by the magazine. They also push for clarity and beauty in how the pieces are designed.

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Virginia Mason (National Geographic Magazine) at @malofiej: National Geographic’s history has always been tied to cartography

No. 15: Don’t forget to draw

As Serra accepted the honor as Malofiej’s most influential graphics artists, and as the producer of the most influential infographics, “La ballena Franca,” Jaime reminds us all that what we do must have a soul. We can’t forget to draw the story, to present it with corazón, feeling and passion.

No. 16: Surviving the future

The only way to survive a tsunami, Tascón says, is to take the wave. To go through it.

No. 17: Work hard to keep our community together

The gathering in Pamplona, at the University of Navarra, at the AC Ciudad hotel, at the Jumping Jester, and elsewhere in that wonderful city is indeed special, the site of much inspiration over the past two decades. One of the reasons is the unique community brought together every year. This year’s gathering included graphics minds from 30 countries — Russia and Argentina, Denmark and Dubai. In these challenging times we need to work hard to keep our community of infographics people working together. To share inspiration and work, to search for new ways of supporting and improving what we do, to make sure the most important parts of it, don’t get lost or compromised. We can do that better if we work together.

No. 19: And give back

The most touching honor of the night went to John Grimwade, graphics director of Condé Nast Traveler Magazine. Grimwade has attended 18 of the 20 summits and taught at 15 of them. He’s met and mentored hundreds. We all need to concentrate on giving back to our community. Paying it forward.

No. 20: A robust process can guide you

Sheila Pontis, a researcher and consultant from the UK, has studied how graphic designers work and diagrammed how each step of a process must further the goal of producing a clear infographic, from brainstorming to sketching to execution.

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Sheila Pontis explaining a research project about information and graphic designers at @malofiej Let’s see what the outcomes are

No. 22: Watch your chart junk

Robert Kosara, Associate Professor of Computer Science at University of North Carolina, Charlotte, currently on Sabbatical with Tableau Software in Seattle, WA., talked about how all decisions an infographics designer makes affect the reader.

No. 23: Tell a story

Make sure a graphic has a narrative, that it tells a story. Picanha’s graphics from the Times always focused on telling a specific piece of the story, putting it in human terms. How one street was affected. Where people went during a string of protests. How a raid was carried out. Those stories were then told visually.

No. 24: Do something outside of working

Nigel Holmes is embarking on a nifty project asking what infographics folks do when they are not making graphics. Holmes crafts some incredible toys out of metal and woods scraps. Lively and fun. The lesson here is that YOU should do something when you’re not working. It helps the mind. It’ll make you better at work to have a more full life.

No. 25: How to be as good as the New York Times

The Best of Show at Malofiej 20 went to the New York Times for two incredible graphics on Guantanamo detainees, online and in print. The Times also took home most of the top medals. The focus and quality fo the work coming from Steve Duenes’ department is utterly groundbreaking and everything they have won is truly and richly deserved. The rest of us should concentrate on learning from them, trying to beat them on our terms, at our places. The only way to be as good as the New York Times, is to work harder and smarter. Clearer stories, better execution, more unique and effective story forms and expressions. More passion. More heart.

[…] and presenting it in new ways. This week’s lecturer, Jonathon Berlin of the Chicago Tribune, gives advice about techniques to make good informational graphics. While this might not particularly be my forté, I’m honestly really excited to use these […]

[…] and presenting it in new ways. This week’s lecturer, Jonathon Berlin of the Chicago Tribune, gives advice about techniques to make good informational graphics. While this might not particularly be my forté, I’m honestly really excited to use these […]

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